Constitutional Court says ‘Yes we can… have good looking MPs’
So we’re finally going to vote for celebrities an actual parliamentarian in next year’s parliamentary elections instead of some faceless political party, thanks to this lengthy verdict by the almighty Constitutional Court.
But didn’t we also vote for individual nominees in the 2004 parliamentary election? In fact, the only reason I still remember about that particular election is because that was the first time I could punch on this lovely lady’s picture on the ballot rather than one of the colorfully unattractive party logos as with prior elections.
Apparently, although we were able to pick any individual candidate we liked, there was a catch: any single nominee who won popular votes but did not make the top of the party list for the relevant district or couldn’t secure a full portion of an obscure mathematical arcanum called the Hare quota (it’s called the “Bilangan Pembagi Pemilih” here) would relegate those votes to the nominee on the top of the party list. In short, many of us were duped.
That’s right, some of you might actually like a particular candidate but detests the party and whatever nominating system it has, in which case your vote for the candidate, most of the time, wouldn’t count.
But is that even possible? I mean when someone runs for government office under a particular party banner, isn’t she saying that she endorses the party and what it stands for? Not exactly. With balance of power increasingly tilting toward the parliament, the political sector now offers the promise of a rewarding career, which means politicians aren’t too motivated to run on promoting their ideology as they are on how to secure jobs for their members until the next election. In fact, figuring out what each of the parties that will contest next year’s election stands for is like figuring out the Higgs boson. In effect, with so many parties that don’t seem to be that much different from one another to choose from, it’s really so much easier to put a check mark on the most good looking face on the ballot paper during the election day.
So the Constitutional Court did good, really. The judges practically stepped into the debate of whether celebrity politicians would add substance or mere good looks to the legislature, and brought legal validity to the latter.
Well okay, not really. The Court just thinks whoever wins the most votes should get them, and if voters happen to prefer gorgeous but brainless automatons over manipulative and ugly sexagenarians, by god we really should have them.
Some commentators such as Mr. Danang Widyoko of the Indonesian Corruption Watch contend that most of the celebrity politicians that were elected in the last election have not mastered the skills needed to be effective at advancing legislation such as lobbying, debating and so forth. He says:
Through my lobbying [for Indonesian Corruption Watch] at parliament I come into regular contact with the celebrities elected in 2004. They really don’t have the capacity to debate or raise issues. They do as they are told by the party leaders, sign their names and collect their pay checks.
But really, with looks like these, who needs persuasion skills?
And one last note, the presence of these gorgeous souls amidst our legislators might also encourage them to cut back a little on their chronic habit of not turning up for meetings.
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December 28th, 2008 at 1:37 am
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